2006 Was the Driest Year on Record

2006 apparently produced the lowest amount of rainfall in Riverside County since annual rainfall had been recorded, at just 1.93 inches. That beat out the previous low of 2.94 inches in 1883.

According to the Press Enterprise yesterday, forecasters had expected an El Nino for 2006, but it never materialized...

The immediate cause of the drought is that ocean temperatures and the jet stream did not combine to bring Southern California storm after storm in what was expected to be an El Nino year, experts said.

"An El Nino ... usually gives us wet years, but it didn't work," said Richard Minnich, a UC Riverside earth sciences professor. "One out of four create drought instead of heavy rainfall."

The Press Enterprise went on to say that because of the high rainfall we had in 2005, plus the water at Diamond Valley lake, there's plenty of reserve to last us another drought year.

I always take interest in articles that talk about Southern California drought, and water reserves. Water is the factor that sits above all the else in determining our future in Southern California. It's going to decide how much it costs to live here, if we have to move out, and even our property values.

All of Southern California is naturally a desert region. It's only because of aquaducts, reservoirs, and underground storage, that we can support these large population centers.

The way I see things, the population in Southern California keeps growing because of illegal immigration, more babies being born than people dying, and Americans moving in from other states in search of warmer weather. At some point in time, the demand for water will surpass the available supply, and create problems. Rationing can only go so far.

The Inland Valley Daily Bulletin published a water article of its own yesterday, but focuses more on dwindling supplies...

The watershed area of the Colorado River is in its eighth year of drought and is now supplying half the amount of water it did five years ago, said Andy Sienkiewich, resource implementation manager for the MWD.

The other primary imported-water area, the Sacramento Delta, only provides 60 percent of its normal supply because its source of water, the Sierra Nevada snowpack, is about a third of its usual size, Atwater said.

My question is, could Southern California ever reach a point where the population becomes so huge, that we just can't import enough water to support everyone?